Nvidia’s $12.9 B Purchase of Hugging Face: What the Deal Means for the AI Stack

On September 3 2026 Nvidia announced a definitive agreement to acquire the open-source AI platform Hugging Face for roughly $12.9 billion. The transaction will pay about $11.9 billion to shareholders and includes an equity-based retention program of up to $1 billion for employees who join Nvidia. The acquisition is slated to close in the first half of 2027, subject to regulatory approval.

CNNAdweekThe VergeBloombergSan Jose Mercury NewsNVIDIA Buys Hugging Face, the Heart of Open-Source AI It's Official: NVIDIA Buys AI Hub Hugging Face For $12.9 Billion

Founded in 2016 by Clément Delangue, Julien Chaumond and Thomas Wolf, Hugging Face hosts more than 3 million open-source models, 500 000 datasets and 1 million applications. Over 18 million developers, researchers and creators use the platform, and more than 200 000 enterprises rely on it to discover, evaluate, customize and deploy AI. Nvidia, the leading supplier of AI accelerators, has contributed hundreds of models and datasets to the Hugging Face ecosystem.

Washington Examiner

• Deal value: $12.9 billion (reported variously as $12.93 billion, $12,930,300,000, “nearly $13 billion”).

CNN

• Platform usage: >18 million users; >3 million models; 500 000 datasets; 1 million applications; >200 000 enterprise customers.

Washington Examiner

• Nvidia’s contribution: >500 open-weight models and >250 open datasets published on Hugging Face.

Washington Examiner

• Financial backdrop: Nvidia posted $96.2 billion in revenue for the quarter ending July 26 2026, a 106 % year-over-year increase.

San Jose Mercury News

The acquisition moves Nvidia farther up the AI stack, giving it direct control over a central hub where developers share and select models—a source of market intelligence that could shape future chip designs. It also positions Nvidia to offset a potential slowdown in hardware demand as major AI labs develop their own chips.

Silicon Republic

Huang pledged that “Hugging Face will remain an open platform for the entire AI ecosystem.”

The Jerusalem PostVariety MagazineBusiness InsiderNvidia Announced Acquisition of Hugging Face for Nearly $13B Nvidia (NVDA) announces Hugging Face acquisition Nvidia Buys Hugging Face for $13B to Strengthen Its Open Weights Strategy Nvidia acquires Hugging Face for $12.9bn Washington Examiner

• Deal size: Sources cite $12.9 billion, $12.93 billion, $12,930,300,000, and “nearly $13 billion.”

New York Observer

• Payment breakdown: Most reports state $11.9 billion to shareholders plus up to $1 billion in equity retention; a few mention a single $12.9 billion figure without detailing the split.

CNN

• Closing timeline: Nvidia expects closure in the first half of 2027, but no specific regulatory deadline has been disclosed.

NVIDIA plans to acquire Hugging Face and keep AI development platform open

• “Together, we will scale Hugging Face's platform, strengthen its infrastructure and expand access to AI for developers and institutions worldwide,” — Jensen Huang, Nvidia CEO

CNBC

• “Open models let startups, businesses, universities and public institutions build on advanced capabilities without training every model from scratch,” — Jensen Huang, Nvidia CEO

Wired Magazine